The Lost Planks
They are scattered throughout the game and seem meaningless at first. If we combine the planks it forms the following image. MurdocLoch, a regular over at the Redlynx forums, set about breaking the code. He had been reading up on Vigenère ciphers — about codes where, if one word is guessed, it’s possible to crack and translate chunks of coded messages. He decided to take a guess at what one of the words might be, and voila! The key to deciphering this code was in the bottom line of the message. Suspecting this would be a console botton input this became the starting point to break the code. Murdoc explains: "I was pretty sure that the last word “LZHHG” was actually “RIGHT” so by plugging “LZHHG” in to the decrypt box and using the key “RIGHT” i got “URBAN” Which seemed like it was unscrambled so I tried to guess the word before which was “OMXM” so now in the decrypt box I have “OMXM, LZHHG” Since i know how ingame passwords work and many of them have an up down left right rhythm to them I guess that this four letter word is left but really if i guessed down wrong left would have been my next guess – so using the key “leftright” the code is decrypted into “DIST, URBAN” or disturban – at this point i know i’m on the right path – I keep working backwards in this fassion untill i have revealed the entire code portion of the cipher “CH, FOOR, HD, PSYU, UC, LQWY, OMXM, LZHHG” using the key “updownupdownupdownleftright” is then decrypted as “IS, CASE, NO, MECH, AN, ICAL, DIST, URBAN” or “is case no mechanical disturban” and i assume that the last word is disurbance so i google in quotes “is case no mechanical disturbance” and the forth hit down in the preview text i see in bold the words in perfect succession – It’s a wikipedia page for the Bohr–Einstein debates!" "Next I simply selected the entire sentence that that portion of the key was found in “'Naturally, in this case no mechanical disturbance of the system under examination can take place in the crucial stage of the process of measurement'.” and removed the spaces and punctuation so i was left with this. So I plugged that into the Key and the text from the signs into the encrypted message box clicked decrypt and voila – the cipher was broken!" Using the highlighted key the message on the lost planks was translated into this sentance: IN-GAME MUSIC TO 0 FROM THE GAME OPTIONS NATURE CALLS WITH SCORPION. START AND PASS THE FIRST CHECKPOINT. LEAP FROM THE ROCK AND STOP ON THE NEXT ROCK. PUSH THE RIGHT STICK- UP, DOWN, UP, DOWN, UP, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT Play close attention to the lyrics in this song since they hint what the next step could be: "Your ears may not catch them, You might have to transform them into visible form". This line led forummember IFTHISTHENTHAT to perform a spectral analysis on the song, wich revealed following image: ' ' With the help of forummember Fatshady it became clear that the spectral analysis holds a hidden morse code, visible on the upper past of the image. This morse code translates into: "Check song spectra in each song"... And that'ss what has happenend. There appears to be morse code messages in Flow, Triumph and Taiko San. On each of these songs the same morse coded line appears: .-- .-- .-- .-.-.- ..-. .. -..- . -.. .--. .- - - . .-. -. . -. -.-. --- -.. . ... .-.-.- -.-. --- -- When translated, you get redirected to the following site: www.fixedpatternencodes.com. Where the following image is visable: Further investigation shows that there appear to be two images. You get the background image (Bg gif) from the css page, and overlay it on top of the main image gif in photoshop using an exclusion filter to reveal this latin text, wich translates into: "Finally, rains are lost when Father Heaven Has dropped them into the lap of Mother Earth. But shining grainfields sprout, and twigs grow green On trees; the trees grow, too, and bear their fruits; Hence our land and the animal kind are fed, Hence we see happy cities bloom with children And leafy woods all filled with young bird-song; Hence flocks wearied with fat lay themselves down Out in the fertile fields, and bright white liquor Leaks from their swollen teats; hence newborn lambs Gambol on wobbly legs through tender grass, Their baby hearts tipsy with winy milk." By Lucretius - De rerum Natura. And this is as far as the progress goes for now. Riddle creator ANBA was quick to comment on the fast progress made cracking this code, but also mentioned the riddle to be far from solved. There is still a lot to discover, some possible paths might be: - Where is Lucretius pointing us to? - The Lost planks were deciphered by force, there is a legitimate way to solve the code and it can be found ingame as suggested by the redlynx crew. Currently we believe that the moneyball skillgame might lead us to find the Niels Bohr quote. - There are still unsolved easter eggs. In particular the "Reclaimed " clue is of interest, since it is believed this might bring us to a new code. Other unsolved eggs are to be found in: "Cliff Jumper " and "Tree Hugger ". And of course... many easter eggs are believed to remain hidden up to date... Lets hunt!